


Memory

by undergrounddaydreams



Series: 100 Themes Challenge [4]
Category: Labyrinth (1986)
Genre: Bittersweet, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-10-01
Updated: 2011-10-01
Packaged: 2017-10-24 05:17:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,689
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/259414
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/undergrounddaydreams/pseuds/undergrounddaydreams
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>On a rainy, quiet afternoon, Sarah goes questing and rediscovers a locked away treasure.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Memory

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: I don't own Labyrinth. I just like to play there. No copyright infringement is intended and no profit is being made. For entertainment purposes and love of the source.

Sarah had gone questing that afternoon, the quiet making her restless. She rocked slowly in the chair by the window, her rediscovered treasure held reverently in her lap. The colors seemed bright, almost cartoonish, in the shadowed neutrals of the room - happy. She flipped the pages slowly, pausing to examine each captured memory preserved on the pages of the photo album. She had dug it out from the depths of the hope chest currently resigned to the attic. The one she kept locked.

Hoggle, Ludo, Sir Didymus – they were all there peering back at her, preserved in time, smiling – well, mostly. The closest Hoggle ever got to a smile was a resigned grimace. Sarah smiled wistfully as her eyes flicked over each snapshot – her "private" 16th birthday party, the one she had in her room after the family festivities were over; the time they had helped her rehearse for her senior year play, complete with costumes and props; the pool party the summer after her first year of college when her dad, stepmom, and Toby had gone out of town to visit Karen's parents. She laughed softly as she scanned the pictures of her friends in the pool. Her favorite was the one where Sir Didymus was bobbing in Toby's superman floaties and Hoggle was sputtering from the wall of water Ludo had made when he had cannonballed into the pool.

Sarah flipped the page. The last set of photos was from that same summer, when they had ventured out to a carnival two towns over. They hadn't gone out in public often, only when she had an overwhelming itch for adventure. Although she was the only one that could see her trio of pals, getting Ludo anywhere was problematic. Sarah smiled as she remembered. Hoggle had taken most of the photos that night, and most of them were of his thumb, or out of focus, or of the ground or sky, or something else entirely unintended. But she loved them anyway, just because he had taken them.

She closed the album, her smile fading. It all seemed so long ago. Sometimes it felt like it hadn't happened at all, like a faraway dream. But the photos were proof.

Sarah looked up at the sound of thunder shaking the quiet stillness, the rain pattering softly on the window. Some memories, those relegated to the recesses of her often faulty recollection...were clear as crystal.

 _You're no match for me Sarah._

She remembered how scared she had been when she'd first seen him, dazzled but intimidated. In truth, she was more scared of what her dad and Karen were going to do to her if they came home to find Toby gone rather than anything he might have done. He had smiled at her, after all, which was more then either of them had made the effort to do. And he had offered her her dreams.

 _It's farther than you think._

When he had leaned over her like that...she had jumped, she remembered. She had been surprised at how close he was behind her, and she had looked away when he lingered, suddenly just a little bit shy. It wouldn't be the last time he invaded her personal space. She had recognized it for what it was – an intimidation tactic, but...

 _And you, Sarah. How are you enjoying my Labyrinth?_

This time, when he had leaned in close, he had smiled at her – a small, teasing smile as he searched her eyes. He had this voice – smooth, and strong, and bittersweet – like brandy. She had looked away again, flustered and unsure. And then, fantastically stupid girl that she was, she had insulted his Labyrinth. Sarah smiled a little as she remembered his reaction. He really was a rotten cheat when it suited him.

 _Choosing a path between the stars..._

That dream! She had been too young then to really understand what was going on in that ballroom. She had a better understanding now, having been to a few wild parties since then, though none nearly so elegantly disguised. She remembered searching for him, and when she had found him he had looked at her with such intensity – it was a powerful feeling, to be the sole focus of his attention. She had been captivated when he had swept her into his arms, and breathless when his eyes slid down over her figure. And then he had begun to sing. The words of the song were burned into her memory like a brand.

She had even thought, at one point, just before the clock chimed and the masked faces closed in, that he was going to kiss her. And she had wanted him to.

 _Everything I've done, I've done for you._

He had walked right through her. It felt like...like nothing she had ever felt before. Kind of like they had connected in some way, at some primal level. Even as she chased Toby over those stairs, she had listened to the words he sang. With that voice, how could she not? He had sounded so…sad. And had he really thought she was cruel?

 _Just fear me, love me, do as I say..._

She had been so focused on remembering that last line that she hadn't understood then. She wasn't really sure if she understood now. The way he had practically pleaded with her at the end, his anger morphing into a sort of desperation. What she remembered most about those final moments was that haunted look in his eyes and wondering, when that bubble popped on her fingertips, what she had done.

And could it even be undone?

Sarah stared out the window, centuries of recycled tears falling from the puffy, ashen cheeks of the sky, soaking the world in a nostalgic sadness. She knew she had a selective memory where the Goblin King was concerned. And she knew romanticized him. Sometimes she wondered if her memories of him were somehow tainted by her fantasies, if she had, in all the time she had spent thinking about him, twisted it somehow, made it out to be something more.

A small whimper pulled her out of the past to the present. Sarah stood, walking over to the crib against the far wall to peer down at the baby fidgeting in her sudden unease. Sarah reached down to brush the soft wheat curls along her forehead, smiling when the little girl wrapped a fist around her pinky, while the tiny fingers of her other hand curled into her mouth as she drifted off to sleep again, comforted. Sarah stared down at her. Would this little girl have an adventure of her own one day? Would she meet a man who enchanted her so completely...

Would she make the same choices?

She jumped slightly at the sound of the front door, startled out of her thoughts.

"Sarah, I'm home!"

Sarah slid her finger free, leaning over to place a soft kiss on the little girl's head. She went back to the window, picking up the photo album from the chair and sliding it behind the books on the bottom row of the bookshelf. She crept out of the room, pulling the door to the frame, and slipped silently down the stairs.

Pausing at the base of the staircase, Sarah leaned against the wall, her gaze directed towards the kitchen. A man was putting away groceries, sliding on the linoleum in his socks, dancing to some song in his head; something he had probably heard on the radio on his way home. Bran. Her husband.

They had met in college, dating for a couple of years and marrying shortly after graduation. That was almost three years ago. Their daughter, Kaitlen, was 15 months.

She had gradually stopped calling on her friends as Bran became more dominant in her life, until she had stopped calling on them at all. She had drifted from the self-centeredness in her teenage years to a more mature awareness of self and how small she was in the world, to self-sacrifice as she became a wife and mother, her childhood tucked into a hope chest gathering dust in the attic and her dreams no longer for herself.

She had never seen Jareth again since that night in the Labyrinth – not brave enough to call on him to find out if it was memory or fantasy. Who was she, really? Some selfish girl who had wished away her little brother.

But sometimes...sometimes she couldn't help but wonder if he ever remembered her. And sometimes she could feel those long buried dreams, hear their soft neglected cries in the back of her consciousness. And it hurt so much to think that they were dying, suffocated by reality and responsibility. That maybe she was dying just a little bit, too.

Sarah studied her husband – his brown floppy hair, the crinkles at the corners of his eyes from his ready smile. Bran was a good man. And she loved him.

She did.

Bran looked up as if sensing her presence. He smiled when he met her eyes. "Hey, beautiful. I didn't hear you come down." He nodded at the brown paper bag on the kitchen counter. "Got your favorite."

 _But..._

"Hey." Sarah slid from the wall, tucking her hands into the back pockets of her jeans as she slinked into the kitchen. "Kaitlen's sleeping." She peered over into the bag - peaches. She took one out, washing it at the sink before taking a bite. She leaned back against the kitchen island as she chewed.

Bran came over to stand in front of her, placing his hands on either side of her waist and kissing her softly. "Mmm." Sarah smiled at him even as her eyes drifted to the window over his shoulder where the rain continued to fall, soaking into the earth, the melancholy lying just under the surface floating up through the everyday grit. Bran nuzzled her hair, whispering into her ear. "And you smell sweet, too."

Lightening flashed and her hand, hanging limply at her side, flexed over the soft fruit.

They never tasted like she remembered.

~o0O0o~

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the 100 Themes Challenge: #11 Memory
> 
> Thanks for reading! Please, leave a contribution in the little box. ;) Constructive criticism is always appreciated.


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